One Year Later
by BLT
Summary: Sequel to 'A Little Day it April' they've had their fun, now it's the Captain's turn. P.S. I'm back! Be afraid!


Disclaimer: I'm just the puppeteer in some very strange plays, I don't own the characters, the ship, the scenario, yada. Real shame though…

Author's note: Hello, I'm back! (Pause for cheering but only a few muffled groans and crickets fill the silence). Okay then, erm, if you didn't gather from the summary of the story, this is a sequel to my original fic, "A Little Day in April" brought back for April Fools Day this year. If you haven't read it recently or at all (as I'm sure is the case for many of you), I suggest that you read it before continuing. (I would set up a link but I don't know how and I'd probably end up sending people to a porn site or something, so it can be reached from my profile). It will be much easier to understand if you do because I will make a lot of references to the prequel. You'll have to excuse me if this seems a little dry. I haven't written much creatively for most of the year. See what essays can do to you? Anyway, enjoy.

One Year Later 

(April 1st, about three in the morning)…

__

Pink mustaches…spools of thread… colds…boot camps… pips…ancient songs… boxers with hearts… piglatin… Borg that pour coffee…

Kathryn awoke with a start from what had to have been the strangest dream ever. She sat up, still in a daze trying to remember exactly what the dream had been about. After searching her mind for more than a minute she gave up, deciding that stress had finally invaded her dreams. Lying back down, she attempted to fall back to sleep, but something kept lingering in her thoughts. Kathryn felt like there was something she had to do, something that the dream had reminded her of. However, as much as she tried, she could not remember anything more than foggy details; sneezes, laughter, words, pips. Finally reaching to conclusion that further sleep was a lost cause, Kathryn got up and walked over to her sonic shower and stripping down, stepped inside. She found herself humming a tune to a song… a very old song. It was something along the lines of "I will survive." Trying to pay attention to her thoughts without disturbing them, Kathryn reached a sort of glossed-over state of consciousness in her attempts to concentrate. For her efforts she discovered that the words that were going through her head were not the real words to the song, but changed to carry a different meaning. Something about rigging display screens, relaying instructions, and surviving the wrath of the Captain… and B'Elanna's voice singing though every com-badge and relay station on the ship. Kathryn snapped out of her daze so quickly that she almost slipped on the squeaky-clean floor of the sonic shower. Scrambling back into her pajamas and out of the bathroom, she started pacing her room trying to remember every detail of the events that had been giving her so much trouble. She had almost reenacted the entire day when a devious plan came into her mind. Kathryn sat down grinning in a giggly, mischievous, and creepy sort of way, coming up with counter-pranks and fiendish plots that would rival those of Chaotica. In an almost insane fit of excitement she cried out, "At last I shall have revenge! Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-*gasp*-ha-ha-ha!"

~The next day, on the bridge.~

Captain Janeway sat down in her chair, struggling to hide a smirk at her plans. "Any thing interesting to report?" she asked to anyone who would answer.

The pleasure, apparently, fell to Tom, who replied, "We're continuing our course for Earth at warp 6."

"Very good," she said, and added to herself while taking a sip of coffee to hide her smile, "funny how he didn't mention that his replicator was malfunctioning this morning so when he tried to replicate a new uniform it came out with bright red hearts all over it. Wonder how that happened?"

"I have something interesting to report," said Harry from behind her, "there's a Z-class nebula about three light-years off our port side, I'm wasn't sure if you'd think it's worth a look."

"Z-class is very rare, it might be interesting," Chakotay chimed in.

"Not to mention hazardous and unneeded," finished the Captain, "We've all seen a Z-class nebula before, and the second thing you learn at the Academy is to avoid them because of their unstable nature and electromagnetic outbursts."

"If we keep our distance then I don't see why we can't go take a look," protested Chakotay, "this is a mission of exploration."

"What would we be going to explore?" the Captain was practically screaming, "these nebulas have already been studied as much as our current technology will allow."

The entire bridge crew cringed under her wrath and suddenly seemed very interested in their consoles. It seemed Chakotay was on his own.

Pulling together what little courage he could Chakotay said, "I was just saying…"

"DROP AND GIVE ME FIFTY!!!" Janeway bellowed.

Startled to the point of no return, Chakotay immediately dropped to the ground and started doing push-ups like his life depended on it, which it seemed like it did.

"How's that for boot-camp?" Kathryn said to herself, clearly satisfied with her revenge for the humiliation Chakotay caused her last year. With a final smirking look at Chakotay, who was still doing push-ups on the floor, Kathryn started to depart from the bridge, leaving the entire bridge crew in shock and fear of her wrath. Before she left, Janeway took a detour by Harry's console and promptly busted him down to cadet: junior grade, using his bringing up the nebula as a rather lame excuse. Deeming that enough damage had been done, the Captain finally left the bridge, and left the crew to suspicious of her sanity.

Kathryn seemed happy with her ingenious method for getting back at getting Harry back for his excessive pips last year and poured herself a cup of coffee to celebrate both that and the fact that the crew hadn't seemed to of caught on yet. Deciding upon an impromptu trip to engineering, Kathryn abandoned her coffee and made sure she had a tricorder handy.

Janeway was struck by a sudden thought when she saw Seven in a corridor and went to astrometrics first. Five minutes later the Captain had left again after carefully rigging all the consoles and display screens to only show information in Latin, not just piglatin. "Figure that out at a glance," said Kathryn, continuing on her way.

Soon Kathryn had reached the door to engineering and after tapping a few choice buttons on her tricorder, she stepped inside. The sight she met was enough to make even Seven smirk. All the engineering personnel were standing at their consoles but looking up as if looking for the source of some unseen voice. This voice, in fact, was a song known as the Hamster Dance. (If you don't know what it sounds like, then go to hampsterdance.com but don't say I didn't warn you). However, her plan was not altogether successful because soon after the song started B'Elanna started dancing around and encouraging other people to dance with her. After a moment of indecision Joe Carry started dancing with her. Within seconds the entire engineering team was dancing around and having a grand old party. Kathryn was just about to leave in an unhappy huff when another sinister idea popped into her mind. Pulling out her tricorder again, she pressed a few more buttons and heard exactly what she had been hoping for. Playing somewhat softly but still unceasingly and unable to be heard by everyone from B'Elanna's com-badge was one of the most dreaded songs in all of human history. (Don't be offended anyone). "Hey Macarena!" Most people in the room shuddered and a few screamed. B'Elanna made a rather futile attempt at making the situation better by launching into the appropriate dance, but was unable to shut it off. Janeway laughed to herself as she left, knowing that even with the dance, the song was going to get old very quickly. She had also made it so that if B'Elanna tried to take apart her com-badge to make it stop, not only would it start playing louder, but also that making so that you can't be reached while on duty was a disciplinary offense. As if to add insult to injury, B'Elanna's shift didn't end for more than an hour.

The Captain decided that then was a perfect time to take a trip to the shuttle bay. She soon arrived and made a few modifications to the Delta Flyer. Struggling not to laugh, and cleaning dye off of her hands, Kathryn left the shuttlebay. Behind her, the back of the Flyer now sported the phrase, "How's my driving? Call 1-800-555-VYGR." She somehow doubted that whoever used the Flyer next would find it quite as amusing as she did, but anyone who was watching the sensors as he departed would be sure to get a kick out of it. A few minutes later, she had arrived at sickbay to reap the benefits of her most recent prank. When she stepped inside Kathryn found the Doctor looking thoroughly distressed. From where he was in his office, he seemed normal, but when he came out to see her, his skin changed to at least five different colors, including red, green, purple, black, and blue, some at the same time.

"What happened to you?" asked the Captain, trying to put on an innocent look.

"Someone, I won't mention names even though I have a suspicion (he coughs 'Tom Paris') has tampered with my holo-emmiters and now as I move to different sections of sickbay I look like a walking talking rainbow," replied the Doctor angrily.

"That's terrible, why would anyone do that?" asked Kathryn, "I'll have Harry look at it as soon as I can."

Saying this, however, caused her to think of Harry's current rank and she ended up laughing out everything she had been trying to stifle the entire day.

"Why do I get the impression that my suspicion of who did this to me is incorrect?" asked the Doctor suspiciously, now a distinctly neon pink a color that seemed to fit his current mood.

"Why would you say that?" replied the Captain, immediately regaining her composure.

"Well, what brought you here," asked the Doctor, trying to make it look like he was changing the subject but really trying to trick her into fessing up.

"I… just wanted to say hi," said Kathryn clearly looking for an excuse, "we haven't seen each other much recently."

"Of course," muttered the Doctor.

"Well, I must go, lots of ship's business to attend to," Janeway said, now desperate and she inched out the door.

Despite the fact that she knew that the Doctor had figured her out and the entire crew probably knew her plot, Kathryn slipped back to her quarters and grabbed some more ammo for the rest of her pranks as she prepared to face the crew at large…

Sometime later, she emerged again, her hair spiked and makeup changed to match, armed with sticky notes with such sayings on them as 'kick me,' 'be nice to geeks,' 'Elvis lives,' and 'peace out' written on them to stick on people's backs. The final touch was a pair of shorts that she was wearing on the outside of her uniform that said 'Angel' on the butt. There was, of course, a small arsenal of secret weapons to use against specific people. First stop; mess hall.

In the corridors and turbolifts, she was met with many a strange stare, most of which she got her revenge on by slapping sticky notes on the crewman's back. Upon reaching the mess hall she was met with more strange looks and a few stifled whispers. Ignoring them, she walked up to the counter where Neelix was serving lunch. Kathryn uncovered an object she was holding which turned out to be a pie.

"Is that for me Captain?" asked Neelix, giving her a look that can only be described as the hairy eyeball. "What did I do to deserve such an honor?"

"Just being the exemplary morale officer you are," Janeway replied. "Here you go."

She proceeded to shove the pie in his face.

Neelix was apparently quite taken aback but he didn't have time to ask any questions because before he could get the pie out of his mouth enough to speak, Kathryn's com-badge beeped and Tom's voice came over it saying, "Captain, could you please report to the bridge."

With an almost punk rock rhythm to her step, Janeway left and was soon on the bridge, not bothering to do anything about her hair or the shorts she was still wearing. The bridge officers and B'Elanna (apparently she had solved her com-badge problem by smashing it and replicating a new one) eyed her suspiciously or fearfully, depending on the person until Chakotay finally spoke up.

"We were all wondering what you've been doing to us today," he said flatly.

"I'm sure you've all compared notes and figured it out yourselves," the Captain replied, "why ask me."

"Because we want to hear you admit to it," said Chakotay.

"Alright, one year ago today, the entire crew ganged up on me and played tricks on me in the name of morale and April Fools Day. I was humiliated in front of my entire crew because of my inability to put it all together. Well this time it was my turn. I decided to get back at each and every one of you. Figured it was only fair, you'd had you're fun, now it was time for me to have mine. So I tried to come up with the perfect counter-prank for the one that each of you pulled on me last year, and I would seem that I have succeeded," Janeway explained. "And I'll make it right."

Soon afterward Kathryn had combed her hair out, issued a ship wide announcement for everyone to check their back for sticky notes, reinstated Harry's rank, helped wipe the cream off Neelix's face, and given out the code required to set com-channels, replicators, and holo-emitters back to normal. However, she conveniently forgot to fit the writing on the Flyer, deciding that it could stay for the time being.

"There," she said, "that's everything, now could we get this ship back to normal?"

"With pleasure," replied Chakotay sitting down in his chair.

Kathryn followed suit, not noticing that everyone on the bridge was sitting with baited anticipation or even that they were paying attention until she had sat all the way down and a rather, erm, fruity sound escaped. Fits of laughter followed as Janeway discovered that she had fallen for the oldest trick in the book, the whoopee cushion. It was a long time before she found out that the entire crew had been watching from display screens throughout the ship, more handywork of B'Elanna.

You like? You no like? You tell me? Please? Thanks!


End file.
